I am always the last to the party on things. Arrested Development, Zumba, iPhones, ironing clothes. I always pile in on it about a year too late, bestowing the virtues of a little-known yet brilliant police drama set in Denmark or "this messenger service thing called Whatsapp" to whoever will listen. I am never ahead of any trend and this is why I was the last single person in the Western World to join Tinder.

It was at about four am on a Sunday morning that my housemates convinced me that everyone — EVERYONE — is on Tinder now. They tell me that I don't have to come up with an excuse for why I join and I don't have to apologise for it. And I resist and resist. I lecture them about the transient nature of looks — how dangerous it is to rate physical appearance above anything else. They tell me that it's no different to approaching someone you like the look of in a bar and to get over myself.

So, in the end, I just fucking joined. I just fucking joined because, honestly, I have absolutely no idea where to meet people anymore. I just fucking joined because everyone around me suddenly seems to be dating ALL the time. I just fucking joined because I think I probably have a rather backwards view about the sort of people who online date, the same way my dad thinks all people on the social networking site "Myface" are "paedophiles and people looking to trash stranger's house parties". I joined because I am weary. And you know what they say, when you get weary — try a little Tinderness.

The deal with my housemates was simple — I'd try it out for a week, I wouldn't be negative about it and I'd go on one date.

"I know your type," one of them barked, snatching the phone off me. "I'll choose all the first ones, you’ll be too picky." I monitor her flicking through hundreds and hundreds of men. Right for yes, left for no. Beards to the right, short-sleeved shirts to the left. Olive skin — right, trilby hats left. Men with guitars please make your way to the right, men holding pints you'll find the exit on the left. Don't call us, we'll call you.

My week on Tinder can only be described as a white-knuckle ride. Within the first two days I am, depressingly, matched with three men I tick who on closer inspection, I realise I have already been on dates with in the past year. Even more depressingly, I find an acquaintance's long-term boyfriend and at least four men who have used their wedding photo as their profile picture. But the most surprising find is a man I had a misjudged snog with aged 21 who is now an ordained priest.

Within a day, I am a woman obsessed with human shopping. Flicking through people like a sofa-hungry slut with a never-ending Ikea catalogue. Swiping left and right and left and right until I am convinced I have developed repetitive strain injury in my thumb. The more I swipe, the more I am matched and the more I am matched, the more I talk about it. On day three in a discussion with my colleague, we work out that we have both fallen for the same smooth-talker who spoke to us simultaneously the night before. I quickly realise that EVERYONE around me has been using it and I hear more and more repeated urban Tinder myths — the soap stars who have it, the man with the 15-inch cock photo. And the endless, hopeful tales of relationships that have come out of it.